Manchester City’s Soccer Stadium Helps Homeowners Outdo United

By Chris Spillane -
Aug 17, 2012

Soccer fans on the east side of the
city of Manchester are outdoing crosstown rival Manchester
United in more than the English Premier League standings.

Home prices near the Etihad Stadium of league champion
Manchester City gained 271 percent since the venue opened a
decade ago, about three times the 91 percent increase near
United’s 102-year-old Old Trafford, according to a study of
Premier League cities by mortgage lender Halifax released today.

Newer soccer stadiums have produced the best results, with
four of the five largest gains in homes located near arenas
built in the past 15 years, according to Halifax, a unit of
Lloyds Banking Group Plc. (LLOY) City’s stadium was built for the 2002
Commonwealth Games in one of the U.K.’s poorest neighborhoods,
increasing the impact of infrastructure improvements on the
local housing market. City moved in a year later.

“East Manchester was a run-down, post-industrial area,”
Suren Thiru, a Lloyds housing economist, said by telephone. “To
coincide with the Commonwealth Games, the whole area was
regenerated.”

The soccer season kicks off today. Manchester City is the
bookmakers’ favorite to retain the English league championship
after winning its first in 44 years in May. Manchester United is
the second choice.

Sheikh Mansour

The average increase in home prices near Premier League
stadiums was 137 percent over the past 10 years, outpacing the
90 percent gain in all of England and Wales, Halifax said.
Manchester City, owned by Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan,
leases its stadium from the local government. In July 2011, the
club was given permission to rename the stadium after selling
sponsorship rights in return for paying the council 20 million
pounds over five years.

The club bought about 80 acres (32 hectares) of land around
its home venue in the two years through 2011. It plans to build
a new training ground and sports-science campus on the site.
Manchester City’s website is linked to east-manchester.com,
which features new housing developments in nine east Manchester
neighborhoods along with local schools, sports facilities and
attractions.

London won the right to host the 2012 Olympic Games with a
pitch that included a pledge to bolster an area of the U.K.
capital known for contaminated soil and disused railroads with
new sports complexes, housing and transportation links. West Ham
United, newly promoted to the Premier League, is one of two
clubs bidding to make the Olympic Stadium their home field after
the games.

British Recession

Homes near the Etihad Stadium have an average price of
about 79,098 pounds compared with 21,328 pounds in April 2002,
Halifax said. Properties close to Old Trafford, less than 5
miles (8 kilometers) to the west, are valued at 154,145 pounds,
up from 80,698 pounds a decade ago.

Britain’s economy is reeling from three straight quarters
of contraction. In June, a U.K. house-price index dropped to the
lowest in a year as property transactions fell for a fourth
month, the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors said Aug.
14.

Residential properties around four of the six Premier
League soccer arenas erected before World War II had the
smallest gains, Halifax said. Average prices by Newcastle
United’s Sports Direct Arena, the U.K.’s second-oldest stadium,
were the only ones to fall, the mortgage lender said. Homes
around the 120-year-old venue, formerly known as St. James’
Park, fell 7 percent to 127,215 pounds in the ten years through
April 2012.

Smallest Gain

Properties near Southampton Football Club’s St. Mary’s
Stadium, which opened in 2001, gained 42 percent to 174,093
pounds, the smallest increase in English soccer’s top tier. The
data was compiled by comparing house-price data provided by the
U.K.’s Land Registry in the stadium’s postal code, Halifax said
in the report.

Liverpool and Everton share the same postal district and
had the lowest average home price in the study at 63,473 pounds.
London football clubs Chelsea and Fulham had the highest average
price at 749,530 pounds. They also share the same postal code.

The Halifax survey covers the stadiums of the 20 teams in
England and Wales playing in the Premier League this season.